Monday, September 29, 2008

I've gotten a good chunk done of what I had hoped to accomplish over the next couple days. Of course, every thing I checked off my little list added two more things that I hadn't thought about, but once I got on a roll it wasn't too painful.

So now, here I sit with my new pattern, all done up in a pretty PDF format, complete with a couple good pictures of the finished object. But now I'm starting to doubt my decision to charge even a small amount for my pattern. Frankly, I'm worried it doesn't make sense, or at the very least, is too long.

I do wonder now though about something else. I've always considered myself a competent writer. I'm a fairly good story teller too, or so I'm told. So why is that writing this blog feels like I'm having to learn a foreign language or something? Am I over thinking it (as I do, on occasion... okay, shut up. So I do it all the time, but do you have to tattle on me?) and maybe it's just my writing style differs from other fiber blog writers? Or am I really sounding as amateur and silly as I think I'm sounding?

Who knows. My brain is about to implode as it is, so I'll leave that debate for another rant. For now, I'm going to try to post my pattern here. Who knows, maybe someday someone will actually read this blog, take a look at my pattern, and be able to tell me if it makes an ounce of sense!

You know that feeling you get in the pit of your stomach when you aren't sure if something will be either a huge disaster or the best decision you've ever made? Yeah, I'm there. You're probably there too, if you're now reading what I should have named "Not Another Knitting Blog", but I'm sure that's already taken. So if you're wondering, yes, this is sort of another knitting blog. And sort of another crocheting blog. And sort of another DIY blog. Heck, I might even throw a curve ball once in a while and toss a recipe at you. So that's why I went with StitchSanity.

You might wonder whether StitchSanity refers to stitching keeping me sane, or whether it refers to my being an insane stitcher. Truth is, I'm not sure which. In fact, at this point, the word stitch has stopped making sense after typing it so many times and I'm having to look twice to make sure that's really how it's spelled. So I'll let you all be the judge of your own definition of StitchSanity. Sure beats me the heck out of me having to figure out what it means for myself.

I could use this first post to tell all about myself, give you all some long back story about who I am, my history or plans for the far future, but the first thing you'll learn about me here is that I don't do things the easy way, ever. I have what I sometimes think is an innate abilty to complicate what is seemingly simple. So, instead, I'm going to let you learn about me in bits and pieces over the next however long it takes me to get around to it sort of time frame, and use this first post to tell you instead my plans for the next two days.

So, as my title already described, here goes nothing!

Last week, I had a plan. Knit a pair of legwarmers for my niece. They turned out great, by the way. Then I noticed she had not a stitch of clothing to match them. Well, it would be simple enough to use up the leftover skein to whip up a matching headband, as the poor girl being barely a year old and what seems to be not ten hairs to her name has a bit of hard time being pegged as a girl at first glance. So I searched for a quick and easy pattern for said headband on my personal favorite website, Ravelry (if you're here, reading about knitting/fiber arts, and you DON'T know what Ravelry is, stop reading, open a new window, and go look it up as fast as you can... it's the single greatest addition to the knitting world since, well, interchangable needles or something. Just trust me). A quick search determined that there wasn't what I was looking for. So I made one up as I went instead, and, frankly, it turned out adorable.

Well, I thought, with it being so easy, and so cute... why not submit it as a pattern to Ravelry?

And then it all began. The first step was tricky. How do I make a PDF file, which is the preferred format for submitted patterns? A little pestering of my computer-junkie brother led me to the answer to this. So this is the first thing I have to complete in the next couple days. Type up the pattern, design the page, and get some good photos. No problem.

Now, the second part was a little trickier. Should I charge for the pattern? Or should I put it up for free? Well, my first thought was I not only wanted to put it on Ravelry, but also on Etsy (think eBay for strictly DIY items, again, if you haven't heard of it, give it a look), and I had heard that you can't offer free patterns on Etsy. So then I decided okay, I'll just make it super cheap. So next on the to-do list, right after actually create the pattern is: set a cheap price, post it for sale on eBay and Etsy, and hope people enjoy it.

Now, I'm a stay at home mom. I love to work with yarn and fabric etc., and I have a head full of ideas that I never manage to actually put into print, or at least on paper. So I figured, if people like the first pattern, maybe I'll actually be motivated to set aside some 'me' time to write down some of my other projects. So I decided the next thing on my list was: delve head first into the world of fiber blogging so perhaps I would have someplace to put finger to keyboard on some of those ideas and projects and see if anyone else out there in cyberland, who isn't already sick to death of the almighty, and abundant, fiber blog, enjoys my patterns and ideas or is inspired by either.

So there you have it. Plan for the next few days is go from barely competant computer user and knitter, to pattern-designing blogger.

StitchSanity

Welcome to my blog! As you can tell it's new, and I'm still going through the process of figuring out how to make this work. If you have any suggestions or comments, please leave them on any of my posts! Thank you!
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